Memory of a Memory

I think...
I believe...
I know...
There was a time before this...
Before this constant... oppression?
No, this constant... presence...
This feeling of gathering thunder storms...
The faint traces of fear on the tongue...

Do you...
Can you... remember...?

Was the sun brighter then?
Was the air cleaner?
Did the birds sing sweeter,
Or the grass grow greener?

I can't quite recall...
I can't even imagine...
Yet it must have been so,
Because I remember -- we all do -- the day it changed.

The day the world... stopped...
And started up again...
Only everything was... upside down...

Inside-out...

Still, after a while, things adjusted...
Life went on, and so did I.

But I've only now realized...
That I've lost something along the way...
A memory... how does one lose a memory?
And yet I have... the memory of the time before...

I know it existed...
But I can't... recall...

And -- how strange it seems...
That there are those, who have not even this memory of a memory.
Those who have spent their whole lives in this... shadow.

Am I more fortunate than they...
Because at least I know what I have lost?
Or are they the lucky ones...
Because no knowledge of a more innocent time troubles their thoughts?

Or are we all equally blind,
Stumbling our way through the murk...

Looking for meaning in a world gone mad?